Many people authenticate themselves to devices they use during their day-to-day lives using passwords, PINs, and/or swipe patterns. For example, a user may secure a smartphone by requiring a swipe pattern or PIN to be entered to access the device. These methods of authentication may be tedious and less secure than using a wearable device such as a ring. The ring may use a short distance communication protocol such as NFC and authenticate the user to the device with a simple gesture such as tapping the back of the smartphone or mere proximity of the ring to the smartphone may be sufficient to trigger the authentication protocol. The ring may not come with its own power source; rather, it may be powered through induction from the device to which it authenticates. This system may not be ideal if the ring is lost or a user is forced to perform a gesture to authenticate to the device. In such instances, mere possession of the ring or similar token may be sufficient to authenticate any user to another device such as a smartphone.